Using her head

CORPUS CHRISTI - Toby Shor, a Corpus Christi art patron, wasn’t thinking about art when Judy Chicago, an internationally renowned feminist artist, author and educator, asked her to model for a life cast. She was thinking about staying alive.

In November 2007, Shor was summoning her resilience and personal strength to stay healthy. Diagnosed with cancer, she had undergone chemotherapy treatments and was awaiting surgery in six weeks.

As Shor’s bald head was cast in Chicago’s Santa Fe, N.M. studio, her upcoming 10-hour surgery with her doctors at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston weighed heavily on her mind.

“I don’t think I gave it a second thought,” Shor said as she recalled agreeing to the life cast. “I didn’t discuss it (being sick and being treated for cancer). I was just trying to survive.”

Shor said she was still in the haze of recovery from surgery when Chicago called to tell her about the inspiration gleaned from the life cast.

Today Chicago’s series of three-dimensional glass casts pieces based on Shor’s life cast will be shown in the “Chicago in Glass” exhibit at the Art Museum of South Texas.

“The Selling of the West” and “Rodeo and the West” exhibits by photographer Donald Woodman, Chicago’s husband, will be shown through May 23. The “Chicago in Glass” exhibit will be shown through May 30. The exhibits’ local showings were made possible by Humanities Texas and Texas A&M University Corpus Christi, which established an honorarium for Chicago.

The “Chicago in Glass” exhibit includes 30 two and three-dimensional pieces representing two glass series. The series on the hand explores its use as a tool and means of emotional expression.

“The Toby Heads” explores the vulnerability, mortality and strength of the human spirit.

Shor met Chicago through her association with LewAllen Contemporary, the Santa Fe gallery that represents Chicago. Their friendship deepened as Shor continued her fight with cancer and Chicago worked with the glass image of Toby’s features.

As Chicago translated Shor’s head into glass from the life cast, it became an entire series.

“First of all she had a really beautiful shaved head,” Chicago said. “There was just something about her head that was moving to me. It just allowed me to do a whole exploratation of mortality and vulnerability and the power of the human spirit.”

Before seeing the pieces, Shor was anxious about how the pieces would look because she did not have any hair, Chicago said.

“When she saw them she realized they are beautiful,” Chicago said. “I think that has to do with the fact that she was willing to let herself be stripped down and so you see the inner beauty which is really what’s important. Glass is a very good medium to convey that. ”

Chicago’s work spans four decades. Her work includes the “Holocaust

Project: From Darkness into Light”, the “Birth Project”, and “The Dinner Party”, an art installation honoring many historically important women from prehistoric goddesses to the 20th Century.

Throughout her career, Chicago has worked with different materials including porcelain painting, needlework, sculpture and painting.